Achievement for All Live Workshops

BETT12 11th – 14th January 2012, Olympia, London.

Achievement for All (www.afa3as.org.uk)
a tailored school improvement framework, delivered in partnership with leaders,
teachers, parents, pupils and support professionals, that aims to raise
the aspirations, access and achievement of pupils identified with SEND.
A two-year pilot has demonstrated unprecedented impact for SEND pupils,
who progressed faster on average than all pupils nationally in English and
Maths. Achievement for All schools may wish to apply the Achievement for
All framework to a wider range of vulnerable pupils in line with their whole-school
improvement strategy.

Achievement
for All will be developing and sharing effective digital practices in raising
achievement within the target group through a series of Achievement for
All workshops to be held at the BETT exhibition in London, 11th –
14th January. Several professional organisations will contribute what is
already known in this area and debate what might be useful in the future.
The workshops are being delivered in partnership with the MirandaNet Fellowship
and students from the University of Bedfordshire.

Achievement for All leads, coaches and champions, and other professionals
attending BETT interested in the aims of Achievement for All, will be invited
to reflect on what has been learnt from the successful Achievement for All
pilot project (2009-2011) and to draw on the range of expert presentations
to debate next steps. Resources will be developed in real time during these
workshops and outcomes used to disseminate strategies on how achievement
can be raised. All contributors will be eligible for a certificate for participation
in a professional development event and access to the resources collected
over the four days.

There are two professional development
sessions each day (Wednesday to Friday) in the form of a live workshop starting
at 12:00 and 15:30 in Gallery Room 1, Grand Hall Gallery,
which is also open all day for networking. Two further live workshops on
Saturday will start at 11:00 and 14:00. Each session will last no more than
an hour. If you want to contribute to this four day event reply to:

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If you wish to contribute at any session during this four day event, please
contact
.

Exploiting mobile technologies in learning
(Part One)

The classroom is not the only place for learning

Wednesday 11th January. Starts at 12:00

The London Mobile Learning Group (www.londonmobilelearning.net)
will be drawing on the findings from their international research to offer
some suggestions for Achievement for All practitioners supporting at-risk
learners. The session will outline the key principles of the socio-cultural
ecology of mobile learning with particular emphasis on at-risk learners
and with reference to specific mobile learning projects. The topics under
discussion will be:

different ways of integrating mobile media into schools in constructive
learning contexts

bridging the gap between the use of technologies in school and in everyday
life

harnessing the power of mobile technologies in promoting learning in
informal contexts.

Invited experts who will introduce the themes will include Professors Norbert
Pachler and Ben Bachmair, Institute of Education, University of London,
John Cook, London Metropolitan University, Donna Burton-Wilcock, Immersive
Education and Jennie Martin, NelsonThornes.

Session led byCherry White, Chief Governance Officer and Sue Briggs, Achievement
for All Regional National Lead.

Exploiting mobile technologies in learning
(Part Two)

Improving opportunities in school for at-risk learners

Wednesday 11th January. Starts at 15:30

This workshop will aim to introduce practical approaches and solutions
to teaching and learning with mobile technologies. The focus of the three
central case studies under discussion will be to make suggestion for Achievement
for All practitioners who are supporting at-risk learners:

benefits and challenges of bringing tablet PCs (such as iPads) into
schools

learner-generated videos and community platform specific solutions for
at-risk learners.

The short presentations will be followed by open discussions where participants
are invited to provide their own experience and to raise questions which
will be discussed with other on-site and on-line participants.

Session led by Cherry White, Chief Governance Officer and Sue Briggs, Achievement
for All National Achievement Lead.

Improving access to achievement using digital
technologies (Part One)

Tools for improving effective learning for vulnerable learners

Thursday 12th January. Starts at 12:00

Achievement for All is a tailored school improvement framework,
delivered in partnership with leaders, teachers, parents, pupils and support
professionals, that aims to raise the aspirations, access and achievement
of pupils identified with SEND. Champions and coaches from Achievement
for All will be setting out the key themes of the framework. Participants
will explore what has been learnt about the value of digital technologies
for vulnerable learners in the first year and what questions need to be
answered as the framework grows. Themes will include diversifying styles
of teaching, exploring independent learning and harnessing the power of
learning technologies used in the home and in social exchanges.

Session led by Professor Sonia Blandford, National Director, and CEO of
Achievement for All 3As, and Maggie Wagstaff, Achievement Coach, with Christine
Terrey, Executive Headteacher, Grays School, Newhaven and Southdown Junior
School, Newhaven.

Improving access to achievement using digital
technologies (Part Two)

Parents, carers and the wider community supporting vulnerable learners

Thursday 12th January. Starts at 15:30

Regional Leads and coaches from the Achievement for All project
will be setting out out the key themes that relate to the role that parents,
carers and the wider community can take in using social media and publication
opportunities to improve the learning chances of vulnerable young people.

Participants will explore what has been learnt about the value of digital
technologies for vulnerable learners in the first year and what questions
need to be answered about building communities of learners as the project
grows. Themes will include: the importance of carers, parents and the wider
community, exploring independent learning and harnessing the power of learning
technologies used in the home and in social exchanges. The potential and
the challenges of social networking will be a major consideration.

Empowering students to harness the power of
social networking for learning

Using the social media to enhance learning communities for teachers and
students

Friday 13th January. Starts at 12:00

Being part of a virtual community can be a powerful means of learning if
the participants know how to use these powerful social media wisely, safely
and for positive learning outcomes. In this unconference leading practitioners
and theoreticians will be debating the value and the dangers of social networking
in learning contexts at home and in school with parents, carers, champions
and coaches from the Achievement for All programme. The participants
will look at current practice and future developments to anticipate how
social networking might be used to support vulnerable learners and their
teachers, and what checks and balances need to be put in place to harness
the power of these new media. There will be a focus on case studies where
social networking has already increased learning opportunities for teachers
and students.

Session led by Garath Jackson, Carey Bennett and Stephen Armstrong, Achievement
for All Regional Leads.

World-wide educational innovation

Raising the achievement of pupils who are not reaching their full learning
potential: a senior manager perspective

Friday 13th January. Starts at 15:30

Chris Yapp, who is researching a book on Pervasive Learning, will chair
this live workshop which is about how the ideals of Achievement for All
can be promoted by the right policies and strategies. He will be supported
by international experts from professional organisations and companies who
have been collaborating on policy reports in 2011.

EDUSummit IT report (UNESCO Paris, 2011) ) written by
world educators who are looking at ways in which vulnerable learners can
be supported by digital technologies in a range of global contexts: rural
and urban; privileged and underprivileged; learners who are challenged and
those who are gifted and talented. A key element of this report is the need
for better deployment strategies by senior managers in ensuing that digital
technologies can be exploited in school. Experts introducing the themes
will be Dr Christina Preston, Professor of Educational Innovation, Bedfordshire
University; Professors Margaret Cox and Eeva Leinonen, Dr Mary Webb, Kings
College, University of London.

The changing landscape: after Becta (Warwick 2011) Members
of ITTE, Naace and other experts in ICT collaborated at Warwick University
in July to review the the role of Becta and predecessor agencies before
the coalition government was elected and to look ahead to a ‘changing
landscape’. In terms of Achievement for All the report stresses the
importance of ICT to engagement and motivation particularly its contribution
for those who find the existing curriculum difficult to access. In this
debate, Micheal Hammond, Sarah Younie and other members of this group will
present their thinking about the future research agenda including personalising
learning; the value of the competent learner; parental engagement; understanding
individual difference; and risk taking online.

ICT Tools for Future teachers: Becta (Pachler N., Preston
C., Cuthell J., Allen A. & Pinheiro-Torres C. (2011) The
ICT CPD Landscape in England, Becta)
A report that will be of interest to schools and companies alike about what
kinds of ICT tools and services teachers and senior managers at all phases
recommend now and what they would like to see in the future. Presented by
Professor Marilyn Leask and Dr Christina Preston.

Teachers taking charge of their own professional
learning

Designing effective continuing professional development programmes

Saturday 14th January. Starts at 11:00

Members of ITTE and MirandaNet will be investigating existing research
findings to suggest the best ways for Achievement for All participants to
learn new ways of exploiting digital media to engage vulnerable learners.
The champions and coaches from the Achievement for All programme will aim
to agree on potential professional development programmes that will be run
by a specialist communities of practice drawn from Achievement for All practitioners.
In this unconference some of the international contributors will be coming
in online.

ICT Tools for Future teachers: Becta (Pachler N., Preston
C., Cuthell J., Allen A. & Pinheiro-Torres C. (2011) The
ICT CPD Landscape in England, Becta)
Professor Christina Preston will report on a section of this research that
identifies the reasons why some respected and talented teachers are reluctant
to use digital technologies in schools in order to challenge some models
of professional development in this field.

Developing global publishing opportunities for teachers and their pupils
in curriculum exchange projects

Research shows that learning improves when self esteem is high. In this
context, engaging with other children around the world is known to promote
a strong sense of identity and personal value. World Ecitizens teacher members
will therefore be discussing the value of their curriculum exchange projects
between schools with MirandaNet Fellows and colleagues from countries including
the Czech Republic, India, Germany, France and Australia. The aim is to
set up some projects between attendees. .

More about Live Workshops

These live workshops, also called MirandaMods,
are participant-driven events that equally involve all the educators, parents
and carers who attend, not just the main speakers. The outputs of these
sessions will be used to create a web-based Professional Knowledge Hub to
be interrogated and added to throughout the life of the Achievement
for All programme.

Invited experts and organisations will briefly explain the specific Achievement
for All related themes for the session from their own perspective. Each
contributor will speak for between 2 to 5 minutes outlining their key points.
Presentation software is not encouraged in order to promote engagement with
the audience, but accompanying resources will be allocated space in the
Professional Knowledge Hub so that more detail can be stored.

Each session will be opened by Achievement for All leads, coaches
and champions who will explain the programme’s aims and achievements
so far. MirandaNet Fellows will explain the principles of a live workshop
and, in particular, how all participants can enter their thoughts and comments
into a collaborative Knowledge Hub as the debate progresses.